


Spend A While Pretending

by BlakeBroflovski



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Anal Play, Barebacking, Bathroom Sex, Breaking Up & Making Up, Changing Tenses, Couch Sex, Long-Term Relationship(s), M/M, Marathon Sex, Mutual Pining, Open Relationships, Pining While In Another Relationship, Polyamory, Rimming, Semi-Public Sex, Side Ships, Stealth Crossover, Strength Kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-10
Updated: 2017-05-10
Packaged: 2018-10-30 07:39:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,934
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10872192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlakeBroflovski/pseuds/BlakeBroflovski
Summary: Hinata supposed he should be thankful, in some way, that he'd never realized what he felt for Bokuto until the moment he also realized it was impossible — he'd never had time to fixate on the idea and get attached to it before it was cruelly ripped away.  But now he'd made his choice, he told himself firmly as he squeezed Tendou's hand.





	Spend A While Pretending

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jenforthewin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenforthewin/gifts).



> Look, all I wanted to do was write a little like, two-paragraph-max scene to preface the "imagine Bokuto eating Hinata's ass with the hunger of a dying man at a buffet" text I sent Hanji, and somehow it turned into 13k words of tenhina instead. I... I have no explanation for this, except that I just... listen. I just. Clenches fist, I just love tenhina So Much that it worms its way into my other pairings, I'm, I can't even act sorry. Happy 5/10 y'all.
> 
> In the tradition I seem to have developed of naming fics for song lyrics, this title comes from Carnor & Gregor's "So Far From Pennsylvania": [[x](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnWicZU8YfQ)]

Hinata walked in on Bokuto and Kuroo fucking in the bathroom his first time at summer camp.

Hinata had always had almost inconceivably bad luck when it came to stumbling upon unsettling people or dangerous situations in the bathroom (Noya laughingly called it his "toilet misadventures"), but of all the confrontations he'd interrupted or even started, sex had never been one of them.  But Kuroo had Bokuto's back pinned to the wall, and Bokuto's shorts were pooled around one ankle with the other slung over Kuroo's hip, Kuroo's own shorts dropped conspicuously low, and yep, that was definitely sex.

It took one heartbeat for embarrassment to kick in, and in the space of that heartbeat, an entirely different emotion set in alongside it — jealousy.

It took another heartbeat for him to understand why, that the sight— no, the mere _idea_ of Bokuto fucking another person made a jealous fire erupt in his chest like an explosive mortar smashing into earth.

It took one more heartbeat to recall that jealousy was an emotion that only presented itself in the face of something it wants, and to draw the connection that if he was jealous at not having Bokuto to himself, that must mean he _wanted_ Bokuto to himself.

This heartbeat seemed to last the longest, because this epiphany struck home deepest, jarring and incongruous and utterly unanticipated.

Over Kuroo's shoulder, Bokuto's eyes locked with his, Hinata's name spilling from his mouth in surprise, and Hinata had been so shocked, drowning under the riptide of these waves of revelation crashing over him, that he very nearly missed Kuroo saying through a snide laugh, "Hey, I know you like him, but wrong name in bed?  Rude."

Hinata ran.

The next morning, Bokuto tried to surreptitiously (as surreptitious as Bokuto was capable of, anyway) pull him aside and apologize, but Hinata laughed it off as the latest in his long line of toilet misadventures, shrugging away the incident and all the emotions and ideas that had come with it.  Bokuto seemed reluctant to let it drop, but eventually he did, under the pressure of Akaashi deadpanning that they should probably start the next match sometime before graduation.  He nearly ran into Konoha as he departed with a doleful stare aimed back over his shoulder.

Hinata supposed he should be thankful, in some way, that he'd never realized what he felt for Bokuto or noticed what Bokuto apparently felt for him until the moment he also realized it was impossible, as Bokuto was spoken for — he'd never had time to fixate on the idea and get attached to it before it was cruelly ripped away.  And now, he decided, he'd just continue to do exactly as he'd been accidentally doing up to now: Not think about it.

The winter camp he snuck into at Shiratorizawa was thankfully devoid of toilet misadventures, but a different misadventure presented itself in the form of a sympathetic upperclassman who eschewed the instruction of his coach and advice of his captain alike.

Tendou invited him to stay in his dorm in secret rather than traveling home and back an hour and a half each way, and Hinata, caught between flattery and laziness, accepted.  Tendou was a good cook and a better cuddler, and his arms were safe and warm in a way that kind of felt like coming home.  He'd never been given exception like this by an upperclassman, and it was thrilling, and dreamlike, and _awesome_.  Tendou's pillow smelled so good, and the star-speckled hoodie he lent Hinata and forgot to retrieve at the end of camp smelled even better.  He came over the next weekend to "get his sweater back" and "watch a scary movie", and they found themselves fucking on the bedroom floor at three in the morning to a backdrop of _Rasen_ playing forgotten behind them, Tendou's hand clamped over Hinata's mouth to stifle his moans, and that was that.

Yamaguchi threw a New Years party and too many people got wind of it somehow (Hinata knew it was mostly his own loudmouth fault, though he staunchly refused to admit it with Tsukishima shooting that derisive look at him), and somewhere in the midst of Ushijima arriving with drinks and Tendou goading Yachi for being skittish of him and Yamaguchi crawling under the kotatsu in search of the lost television remote, Kuroo planted a kiss on Bokuto's cheek and turned away, flopping onto his side, spooning Oikawa from behind and kissing the back of his head.

Hinata still swears that for a moment, the world stopped spinning.

Sugawara, the only one to notice Hinata's uncharacteristic quiet in the bedlam, had wheedled Hinata into sharing what he'd seen and then explained with a laugh that they're poly and open.

"Bokuto is also dating Akaashi, and Kuroo is QPs with Kenma and is trying to date Tsukishima and is sleeping with Oikawa, and Oikawa is dating Iwaizumi, and I'm sleeping with them both while dating Daichi—"

"You too?"

"Yeah, what, is that unexpected or something?"

He watched as Bokuto pulled up Kuroo's shirt and blew a raspberry on his back, and as Oikawa reached backward around Kuroo to slap at him.

"Why, though?" he asked Sugawara.  "Why would you feel the need to?"

"Well," Sugawara said through a mouthful of takoyaki, "you love your mom, right?"

"Yeah, but I don't want to sleep with her."

"No no, just follow me a minute.  You love your mom, and you love your sister.  And you love me, and Daichi, and Yachi-san, and Ukai-san, and Take-chan.  And in some way, you probably love Kageyama too, right?"

"Just don't tell him that," Hinata muttered, checking that Kageyama was well out of earshot.

"And none of those loves detract from the others, right?"

"Right…"

"So why would one boyfriend detract from another?"

Hinata blinked at the tabletop, unsure what to make of that.  "You make it sound so simple, but I don't know that it is."

"Sure it is.  Think of it like pieces of a puzzle.  You've got all these sides and curvy edges and stuff, how can you possibly expect one person to stretch themselves to fill in all those spaces?  Every person in your life fills you up in some way.  It doesn't mean you're not capable of loving all of them."

"But… isn't it cheating?"

Sugawara shook his head.  "Only if your other partners aren't okay with it."

"How do you know if they are?"

"You ask."

Inch by inch, the world slowly started spinning again, and Hinata just stared into blank space somewhere around the bare patch of Bokuto's stomach that had come exposed as his shirt had ridden up while he did a back somersault because fuck, _f u c k_ , this changed everything.  The nonchalance in Kuroo's voice as he'd scolded Bokuto for calling out the wrong name suddenly made all the sense in the world, because why would he be bothered by Bokuto liking someone else if they were both actively dating and fucking all kinds of someone elses?  And so Hinata could've been thinking about it all along and he just. didn't. think. to ask.

He jumped when Tendou took up his hand in a gentle but solid grip.  "You okay?"

"Hm?"

"You were all zoned out.  You flaggin' already?  It's not even ten yet."

"No, I… did you know Bokuto-san and Kuroo-san have an open relationship?"

"Huh?  Oh.  Yeah," Tendou said, and something in his tone made Hinata's stomach flip over, an animal playing dead.  "Bizarre, isn't it?"

"Yeah," he said, laughing hollowly, thoughts orbiting around everything he could've been entertaining since summer if only he'd known.  But now he'd made his choice, he told himself firmly as he squeezed Tendou's hand, so he needed to just keep on doing more of the same, and not think about what he'd given up in exchange.

And so he did.

Or, at least, he told himself he did.

He celebrated to himself when Bokuto and Tendou chose the same university in Ikebukuro, and celebrated even more when Tendou's housing plans fell through and he ended up temporarily bunking with a childhood neighbor in the apartment right next to Bokuto and Kuroo's two-bedroom.  His bubble of excitement threatened to pop when Tendou got his own place, but it turned out to be just one floor directly above theirs, and suddenly Hinata couldn't think of enough excuses to come all the way to Ikebukuro for a visit.  Tendou's old neighbor Arakita turned out to be more of a boon than Hinata could've imagined, his dedication to killing Team Mystic gyms and dragging his flatmates along being the bridge that brought Bokuto to his side for those few moments every month.

Hinata tried to convince Tendou not to quit volleyball and cajole him into joining the university club.  All his efforts, large and small, were in vain, as Tendou elected to sleep and read Weekly Jump instead.  Hinata lied to himself about why his failure disappointed him so much.

Bokuto showed up to high school camps and tournaments and qualifiers often, sometimes because his alma mater was there but sometimes for no reason Hinata could discern, and he had to continually tell himself the tapdance his heart did every time the familiar tufted silver hairstyle came through the doors was just a result of seeing his volleyball ace idol, and nothing more.

Hinata couldn't go to Arakita's boyfriend's university initiation party, as it was at an 18+ venue and his own eighteenth was still several weeks away, but his boyfriend mailed Hinata a video of some of the partygoers on the dance floor.  The video was nearly over before Hinata noticed Tendou was in it too.  His stomach churned with the sharp nausea of guilt, but he'd just… never noticed how the deep cuts of muscle in Bokuto's thighs created sharp lines on his skin, and the way he bit his lip every time he cocked an eyebrow had Hinata's gut in coils.  He saved the video and watched it for three hours, trying to devote as much time to watching Tendou as to watching Bokuto but continually catching himself skewing dangerously unequal.

A few days later, Hinata got a phone call.

Akaashi, Bokuto informed him in a tear-strangled voice, couldn't continue trying to uphold the taxing dichotomy of being his boyfriend as well as his self-imposed mediator and had put an end to all aspects of their increasingly turbulent relationship, and Kuroo was at Tsukishima's for the weekend and he couldn't be alone right now and he didn't know who else to call.  The dizzying headrush of guilt told him he shouldn't, but he was on a train within minutes nonetheless.  He spent the night on Bokuto's couch with Bokuto curled around his side, his head on Hinata's chest, tears soaking Hinata's shirt.  Hinata stayed wide awake until daybreak, trepidation jolting through him like a live current.  It took every ounce of concentration to still the trembling in his fingers as he traced patterns across the breadth of Bokuto's shoulders, every fiber of will not to cup his chin in hand and tilt his face up and kiss him or let a hand dip under his collar and touch his bare skin, all his self control dangling off the edge of a precipice.  He prayed it would hold, and that Bokuto wouldn't ask why he kept sighing or why his heart was pounding so hard.

In the morning, though, Bokuto silently took one of Hinata's hands in his and kissed the back of it.  Then he looked up and met Hinata's stare, the light of the dawn igniting his eyes in glowing golden fire, and just as silently, he shifted upward.

It wasn't anywhere near what Hinata burned for, was barely a brushing of lips over lips, but it counted.  He knew that.

He didn't tell Tendou.  How could he?

He forced himself to find fewer and fewer excuses to come to Ikebukuro after that, but every time he caved, he found more and more excuses to linger.  Only when Bokuto retired for the evening did his excuses run dry.  There were nights he had to sprint to catch the last train back to Sendai.  They never talked about it, but sometimes, he would feel Bokuto's gaze on him and look at him just in time to see him glance away, and he knew he'd been thinking about it.

He finally found pause when he realized his invitations from Tendou were dwindling, too.

They'd been planning all along for Hinata to move in with him after this two-year separation — like Arakita and his boyfriend had done, to apparently wild success — but Tendou had lost interest in phone apps and he had never joined the volleyball club, and those were really the only things Hinata came down for, so Hinata began to suspect that perhaps Tendou's waning interest in those two areas of commonality had left his interest in Hinata waning in kind.

At least, he hoped that was the reason, but a swirling nausea in his gut told him otherwise.

At Hinata's last nationals, Karasuno fell further and further behind in their semifinals match against Fukuroudani.  Hinata had woken up irritable and had grown increasingly distracted and scattered, unable to get a grip on that thread of focus that would keep his head in the game.  But after landing a lucky, barely in-bounds spike, a holler rose up from the stands behind him, a familiar cry that made him whip his head around in midair.  He slipped as he landed and fell on his ass but he didn't even feel it because Bokuto was there, had wormed his way to the front row, his hulking form blocking the view of people at least two rows back behind him, and he was on Hinata's side, not cheering for his alma mater, not even for Karasuno as a whole, but for Hinata alone.

Hinata had no problem landing spikes after that.

After they scraped a victory in the third set, he dashed into the hall, sprinting to Bokuto with an ear-splitting yell and leaping in the air for joy, and Bokuto caught him.  It wasn't what Hinata had intended, but _fuck_ , Bokuto was _strong_ , and he held him like he weighed nothing, pulling him to his chest and holding him with a steady tightness like for all the world nothing else existed, and for a timeless, spellbound moment, nothing else did.

It wasn't until Bokuto put him down at last that he noticed Tendou over his shoulder, staring at him with a silent and unreadable look.

They fought, _really_ fought, for the first time that night, screaming at each other in the lobby until hotel staff kicked them out.  The shining warmth of Hinata's victory had evaporated like alcohol spilled on pavement.  The face he had once loved had turned unrecognizable, pushing all his rage buttons at once like a child mashing a keyboard, and in his frenzy, his fury divorced from humanity, Hinata threw a punch at it.  It didn't matter that he missed.  Tendou had gone silent and unreadable again, and though tears streamed down Hinata's face, freezing to his cheeks in biting points in the cold, Tendou's remained dry and blank.

They didn't break up — or at least, they didn't say they did — but when Tendou walked away into the dark without another word, it didn't feel resolved for the better.

They barely spoke more than curt pleasantries until March, when Hinata received confirmation he had passed Younan's entrance exam and mailed Tendou to say so.  He didn't ask if this meant they would still move in together, but the question dangled on the end of his text signature nonetheless.  Tendou replied asking him to come down.

The ride seemed to last for years, as though the train were transporting him to some other dimension where his stomach wasn't being shredded by the claws of anxiety and everything would be okay.

Tendou did not want Hinata to move in.  What he did want was to break up.

Hinata had expected as much, but it still came as a blow, as if the punch he had thrown outside the hotel had not missed after all, but had flown through time to hit him soundly in the gut.

He stumbled over words, anything in any language that would make Tendou take it back, but nothing came out.

Tendou's eyes swam with emotion but his voice was flat and bleak as he explained that he wasn't in love anymore, that he wasn't sure he ever really had been, and in fact, wasn't sure romantic love was an emotion he could experience at all.  He apologized for not having said so until now, and wished he'd been honest about it sooner, but he'd never meant to hurt anyone.  He'd just never been doted on or wanted before, and he'd been flattered by Hinata's attention (a sentiment that confused Hinata, as he'd felt he had been the one motivated by the flattery of attention), but as that wore off, Tendou had found that being in love felt more and more like routine than anything, like a chore he'd grown tired of performing.  Hinata couldn't pretend he understood, but there was one thing, at least, he knew with perfect clarity: Whatever this started as, and whatever it had grown to be over time, it's over now.

It's a realization that stretches from there into eternity, bringing the past into the present and laying it all out before him like a film reel, something he could flick through at his leisure but never took the time to really appreciate while it was happening.

And now the credits are rolling.

Somewhere between Tendou quietly closing the apartment door after him and ding of the elevator arriving in the lobby, it all comes crashing down on him in one terrible, earth-shattering, breathtaking moment: It also means all this guilt, all the regret and fear and denial, is over.  There's no reason to feel it anymore.  It's a callous realization, but a truthful one, that the past can't be changed any more than he can unscore the point that lost Tendou his last national qualifiers, and just as it was foolish for Washijou to begrudge him that point and continue to heap punishments upon him for it long after the fact, it is just as foolish for Hinata to beat himself up about this, to continue feeling things that no longer need to be felt.

He thinks back to that moment when the world stopped spinning.

What if he'd made a different choice, right then and there?  What had made him think, then and for all this time since, that he couldn't?

Could it really be that easy?

He walks out of the high-rise into the crisp March night and stands still for a moment, throat aching from the bite of the cold air and the tears he will not allow himself to shed, before he turns around and walks right back in.

He pounds so hard on Bokuto's door that Arakita bellows at him through the walls, and when Bokuto finally answers, wearing a t-shirt and boxers with an Xbox headset slung around his neck, Hinata waits only long enough to discern that Kuroo is working a closing shift and Bokuto is home alone before he slips under his arm and into the apartment.

He marches straight to the couch where Bokuto had kissed him after he lay burning all through that sleepless night last year, and at the memory, the burning starts anew, a fire cradled deep in the cavernous recesses of his chest.  Losing Tendou hurts, still being in love with him hurts worse, but it's not the only love he's allowed to have, and he's been denying this one far too long.

"Do you remember when I walked in on you and Kuroo-san in the bathroom at summer camp?"

Behind him, Bokuto's voice is deadened with the lifelessness of embarrassment.  "Vividly."

Hinata stares at the couch, this all-important couch that had changed everything, and as he stares at its cushions the words begin to spill from him, gushing forth like blood from a wound — everything he had never admitted, even to himself, about wanting and trying not to want and burning and trying not to burn and having never meant to hurt Tendou and how Tendou has now hurt him without meaning to and how sometimes the sheer weight of it all has felt like trying to stop a boulder rolling down a hill with a single finger — and when his throat has gone scratchy and he has bled himself dry, he finally turns to measure Bokuto's face.

He looks more owlish than Hinata has ever seen him, his eyes round and head tilted into an angle, the tufts of his hair creating an effect comical enough to send a giggle crawling up Hinata's throat and escaping through pursed lips.

When it dies, it leaves a strange hollowness in its wake in the shape of Bokuto's mouth, a hollowness Hinata suddenly yearns to fill.

He doesn't know if what he heard Kuroo say in the bathroom nearly three years ago is still true, but he remembers it nonetheless.  The freshness of the memory burns like stepping on embers, a very different burn from the concussive explosion of jealousy he'd felt in that moment.

He still couldn't understand why Tendou had felt that same flare of rage over Hinata leaping into Bokuto's arms at nationals.  It continued to elude him how anyone could get so jealous over someone they didn't even love — or maybe it doesn't have an explanation; maybe it's just backwards for no reason because feelings are hard; he doesn't know.  He doesn't know.  But Bokuto's expression of dull shock slowly settles into a longing so strong Hinata is struck with the sensation of looking into a mirror, and what Hinata does know, for absolutely certain, is that he has spent the better part of three years trying desperately not to think about this for one reason or another, and now, at long last, he has no reason not to anymore.

One thing he had not considered, however, was that for Bokuto's part, he had seen no reason at all not to think about it, and had spent the better part of the same three years doing every inch of all the longing Hinata would not allow himself to do.

Bokuto crosses the distance in two strides and tackles Hinata with such force he bowls them both over the back of the couch.  He catches them on the cushions as he falls, dragging his weight on top of Hinata and slipping Hinata's shirt off, and his mouth tastes of fire, and his arms feel safer and warmer and more like home than Tendou's ever did, and in all of three years' worth of hiding and dodging and lying, nothing could have prepared him for the _heat_ of it.  Bokuto presses a thigh between Hinata's legs, and Hinata whines at the wonderful, delicious relief of that simple pressure, grinding his crotch against the thick meat of Bokuto's bare thigh.

Bokuto growls into Hinata's throat, each puff of his panting like a cloud of fire over Hinata's skin.  "I wanna say something really graphic."

Hinata's heart pounds so fiercely he can hear it like a train in his ears.  "Yeah?"

Bokuto's voice has gone husky in his want, and he breathes into Hinata's ear in a whisper that sends shivers shooting down Hinata's spine.  "I wanna know what sounds you make when you're getting fucked."

Hinata finds himself struggling to draw breath through the blooming heat in his chest.  "That's an interesting coincidence," he manages to say, "because I'm dying to show you."

Bokuto and Kuroo, and many of Kuroo's additional partners, had apparently yet to find a surface of the apartment that could not be fucked upon, and condom foils could be found springing up like mushrooms after rain from all manner of places, such as between couch cushions.  Bokuto plucks one out and rolls it on, and Hinata worms out of his pants, leaving them in a pile on top of Bokuto's boxers on the carpet.  He straddles Bokuto's lap and allows Bokuto to fish out a small bottle of lube from beneath a neighboring cushion and finger him open.  When he's ready, he sinks down onto Bokuto's cock until he's flush against him, and he plants his face in Bokuto's shoulder and shivers so badly Bokuto asks him in a voice tremulous with nerves if Hinata has done this before.

He has, but not with Bokuto, and he's wanted to with Bokuto for _so long_ that feeling him inside him at last is pretty overwhelming.

"Plus," he chokes out, "you're a lot thicker than I'm used to."

Bokuto gives him a wolfish smile.  "You always know exactly what to say."

He notices Bokuto is wearing the wisdom of the ace shirt, the one Hinata loves so much he had to get one of his own, and Hinata kind of wants him to leave it on while he rides him, but he wants to see him naked even more.  He peels the shirt over Bokuto's head and _goddamn_ , the bulges and ripples of his chest, his shoulders, his _arms_ , have Hinata so breathless his head starts to spin.  Those arms flex as Bokuto grips him by the elbows and helps him lean back, angling Bokuto's cock inside him to nudge his prostate, and Bokuto hangs on as Hinata grinds down on him for dear life.

Hinata cums so hard his legs shake and his face goes fuzzy and stars pop behind his eyes, and if not for Bokuto holding him up, he would fall back onto the card table.  Instead, Bokuto reels him in by the arms and cradles him to his chest, petting his sweaty back in long lazy strokes as Hinata gasps his exhaustion.

Bokuto's voice is a purr in his ear.  "You up for more?"

His heart jumps up his throat.  "Right now?"

"Right now."

He can't remember the last time he and Tendou had a marathon lovemaking session, or indeed, if they ever did, and can't use memory to say with certainty whether he's capable of such a thing.  But Bokuto's chest under his arms is too much to resist in any circumstance, capability be damned, and he nods.

Bokuto stands up with Hinata in his arms, his cock slipping out as he moves.  Hinata is still small, but not quite as lithe as he was when they'd met, and the ease with which Bokuto can lift him is so surprising that even now, boneless and breathless, Hinata yelps and scrabbles for purchase on his shoulders.  Not that he needs to — Bokuto bears his weight as if Hinata were made of foam — he's simply not used to being manhandled so effortlessly like this.  But as he settles into the iron cage of Bokuto's arms, he decides this is something he could _definitely_ get used to.

Bokuto carries him to his private bathroom.  He stands him on the tile and turns him around, laying him across the cold countertop of the sink on his belly.  The condom is spent, and Bokuto discards it, but he doesn't get a new one.  He leans over Hinata, his weight warm and heavy on Hinata's back, and he says, "I want to do it like this.  Is that okay?"

He doesn't specify what exactly it is that he wants, but the silken hardness of his bare cock on Hinata's ass cheek does all the elaborating for him.  Hinata goes cold, his skin prickling with gooseflesh.  _This_ , he knows he's never done before, and the idea of Bokuto spilling inside him sets his core to shaking.  Too giddy to find words to befit his enthusiasm and too worn out to make his mouth form them, he nods and makes a sound of approval.

" _Fuck,_ I love you."  Bokuto's fingers are firm as they gather the lube smeared across his cheeks and rub it into Hinata's oversensitive hole; he squirms beneath Bokuto's weight in response to them.  "This is the best day of my life.  I have wanted you _so_ bad, and even Tetsu won't do it raw."

This is surprising; Hinata would've thought Kuroo and Bokuto would bareback like rabbits.  A finger breaches him as he croaks out, "Why?"

"He's scared of UTIs," Bokuto says conversationally, as if he were discussing the weather with two fingers shallowly sliding in and out of Hinata's ass.  "But I think I can get you clean enough, if you're game.  You sure it's okay?"

Bokuto is flicking over his prostate and he's almost too overstimulated for it, legs shaking from trying to keep reasonably still.  Knowing he'll scream loud enough to alert Arakita next door if he opens his mouth, Hinata simply nods again.

" _Excellent,_ " Bokuto says, planting a kiss on the back of Hinata's neck.  Then his weight and his warmth are gone from Hinata's back, and his fingers are gone from Hinata's insides, his hands gripping him by the thighs and edging his legs apart until his hole is completely exposed.

A tiny involuntary yip escapes from him as a sensation he's never felt before slicks over his hole, warm and wet and smooth, and it's not until the sensation disappears and Bokuto spits toward the floor drain and mutters "God, this lube tastes like candle wax, who the fuck bought this?" that he realizes the sensation is Bokuto's tongue.

He isn't given time to process this before it's back with force, Bokuto's nose pushed into his crack, mouth pressed against him with such vigor Hinata can feel teeth grazing him.  He spreads Hinata's ass further by hand, thumbs pulling him open by the cheeks, and Hinata whines in earnest at Bokuto's tongue pushing into his hole.  Partly on purpose, mostly on reflex, Hinata grinds his ass back into Bokuto's face, and Bokuto pulls his head back, laughing.  "You act like you've never had your ass eaten before."  Hinata shakes his head, and Bokuto's tone goes from playful to serious in a heartbeat.  "Oh shit," he says.  "Well then.  Lemme show you how it's done."

Bokuto shifts his hands so that he holds Hinata by the hips while his thumbs still spread Hinata open.  He spits inside him, then presses his tongue into him, lapping at his insides with the broad flat of it and tracing his hole with the tip, building a rhythm that has Hinata whimpering and shivering.  Hinata has never found it particularly easy to give in to relaxation and stop his muscles from tightening, but the slippery pliancy of Bokuto's tongue and the skill with which he uses it have Hinata's whole body melting into gelatin.  He licks at Hinata's hole with a hungry urgency that has Hinata caught between rocking back into it and losing power in his legs altogether.  Then Bokuto locks his mouth around Hinata's hole and _sucks_ , pulling Hinata in to him all the way down to the curling of his toes, like pulling a drawstring, if a drawstring could wail pitifully and slap the formica of the countertop from overstimulation.  He withdraws to spit toward the floor drain again, but his tongue is replaced by two fingers, pushing deep into Hinata and wriggling with no rhythm or pattern, seeking seemingly no other goal but to touch as much of Hinata's insides as possible, and Hinata struggles to keep his feet on the floor.

A shift in the angle of the fingers is what alerts Hinata to Bokuto rising to his feet, but he doesn't possess the strength to look over his shoulder and see what he's doing, so it's not until he hears the hiss of water on the floor and a metallic grinding that he realizes Bokuto has turned on the shower and detached the shower head.  The fingers inside him falter as Bokuto tries to juggle several tasks at once, and the spray hits his calves for a moment, just this side of comfortably warm.  Then the fingers pull out and the hand returns to its place on Hinata's hip, thumb holding Hinata's hole open to the air once more, and Hinata's sluggish brain figures out what's going to happen a nanosecond before it does.

The spray goes shooting straight up his guts, and Hinata just about goes through the roof.  The only thing keeping him pinned to the sink, apart from sheer exhaustion, is Bokuto's hand clamped on his hip, and that is soon gone too as two long fingers push into the water, twisting inside him and rubbing as much of his walls as they can reach.  Hinata buries his mouth in the crook of his elbow to keep from yelling.

"No," Bokuto says behind him.  "Let me hear you."

As if to enforce his wish, his fingers spread Hinata's hole far enough that the jet of water tickles up his prostate, ripping a scream from his throat.

"That's it," Bokuto praises, his voice ragged, "that's my baby."

Then the water is gone as abruptly as it came, and Bokuto's tongue is back, licking up his hole before the shower head has even clattered to the floor.  Bokuto laps at his insides, his outsides, his own fingers in his desperation, teeth biting into Hinata's skin, and his fingers can't seem to decide whether to keep him spread open or piston in and out of him with abandon, and Hinata tugs at his own hair and cries out into the sink.  Bokuto withdraws his fingers and gives a mighty suck on the water inside him, spits it to the drain, another, spits, and thrusts his fingers back in once more, standing up to open the mirror cabinet over Hinata's head with his spare hand.

Now that the lube has been effectively washed and sucked away, Hinata's hole is beginning to burn from the makeshift lubrication of quickly-congealing spit, and the crack of the new bottle being opened behind him cuts a thread of mounting tension in his shoulders.  Bokuto removes his fingers and puts the bottle on Hinata's hole, squirting a generous amount directly up his insides.  It's colder than the tepid water had been, and Hinata squeaks and writhes.  When Bokuto replaces the bottle in the cabinet and closes the mirror, Hinata feels a cold dribble leaking out of his gaping hole, running down his taint to his balls.

Then something much warmer presses against his hole, and Bokuto puts a hand on Hinata's shoulder to pin him to the sink, the other hand gripping his hip hard and pulling back on him as he thrusts forward, driving the full length of his cock up Hinata's ass with one stroke.

Bokuto really _is_ thicker than Hinata is used to, and at this angle, he's reaching a fair bit deeper too, and for the first few powerful thrusts it's all Hinata can do to keep his eyes open as he's jolted into the counter.  He tries to brace himself against the bowl of the sink, but Bokuto is so _fucking strong_ , and there's not a lot he can do to mitigate it.  He vaguely recalls an exchange about wanting to hear him make noise, but he's not doing it on purpose — yelp after yelp, screech after screech escapes him, raw cries torn from his throat as Bokuto pounds into him like a jackhammer.  The cries seem to stoke the flame of Bokuto's fervor, and he moves his hand from Hinata's shoulder to grab him by both hips, tugging his body back onto every thrust as he fucks him even harder into the counter.  Hinata cries out, and Bokuto lets out a heated moan, punctuated by the slapping of his hips on Hinata's ass.

"Fuck, baby, you're so fucking tight around me, you feel so fucking good, I'm not gonna last much longer."

Hinata whines.  He can feel it, too — the narrowness of his walls and the force with which Bokuto rams his thick length up them melding into euphoric friction and pressure deep in his guts.  There's an ache building inside him, a steadily tightening coil that begins to beg for release with each smack of Bokuto's hips against his body and each stab of his cock plowing up his tight insides, and he reaches back with a hand to feebly grab at Bokuto's wrist.

He chokes out, "More."

"More?"

"Please… please."

"C'mere."

Bokuto pauses his rhythm for a single second, just long enough to grip Hinata by the thigh and twist him onto his side, lifting his leg high and hooking his heel over his shoulder, locking eyes with Hinata before he rams into him again.  Hinata hadn't noticed the slight upward curve of Bokuto's cock until now, shoving into him sideways and pressing against his walls at angles he never imagined, and he lets out a shriek that gets truncated into staccato as Bokuto pounds into him fast and hard, robbing him of breath.

"God, look at your face," Bokuto breathes, his own flushed and slick with sweat, his brow furrowed in wonder.  His hand slides up and down Hinata's raised shin, a slow, gentle motion in stark contrast with the hard thrusts he beats into Hinata.  "You're so beautiful."

Hinata whimpers.

His hand glides lower, tickling down Hinata's inner thigh, and comes to rest in a warm fist around Hinata's cock.  He doesn't even have to move it, the force of his own thrusts rocking Hinata's cock into his palm and jerking him off for him, and it's not even a minute before stars pop behind Hinata's eyes and the coil springs free in an eruption of heat that soars clean off the countertop.

Bokuto lasts only a few seconds longer, and Hinata feels the alien, almost nauseating sensation of cum spilling up his guts as Bokuto grunts his release, grinding slowly against Hinata's cheeks to milk himself out.

The shower head landed near the drain, and Hinata can see the spray washing his own cum down it, a smear of white lazily swirling around the blue tile.  His throat burns from screaming and his face has gone pins and needles again, but his hips and his guts are going pleasantly numb from being fucked so thoroughly, and he scarcely feels it when Bokuto's softening cock slips out of him this time.  Bokuto leans over him, resting an elbow on the countertop, chest heaving with each gasping breath.  The swells of his chest are so goddamn sexy, flushed with heat and the nipples drawn to points, and the ripples of his stomach are framed so beautifully by the deep cuts of the inguinal ligaments that point the way to a mound of glistening pubes, and _fuck_ , Hinata has never seen someone so pretty, and a dizzying rush of heat races from his heart up his throat as he realizes this someone is finally, after all these years, _his_.

With an arm that feels like rubber, he reaches up and pets Bokuto's hair.  Bokuto, who had shut his eyes in exhaustion, looks up and meets his gaze, his face forming an adoring smile to match Hinata's own.  Hinata crooks his fingers behind Bokuto's ear, and Bokuto takes the hint, leaning down those last few inches to kiss him full on the mouth.

He giggles breathlessly against Hinata's lips.  "Good thing I've already got the shower on, huh?"

Hinata's brain has turned into a porridge-like slush and it takes him a moment to figure out what that's supposed to mean, and even longer to start trying to vocalize that he's not entirely sure he can manage washing himself at present, but Bokuto seems to empathize, because he casts a baleful glance back at the soap and shampoo bottles that may as well be miles away at their distance of one meter, and amends, "Maybe just a simple rinse for now."

Hinata giggles his agreement, and Bokuto helps him to the floor.  They take turns spraying each other down for a few minutes, and then Bokuto goes to turn off the water and put the shower head back while Hinata fishes a few towels out from under the sink.  Bokuto wraps his hair up like a turban and does the same to Hinata, tugging a towel the size of a tablecloth around his shoulders and pressing a slow kiss to his forehead.

Hinata has never been fucked so hard he couldn't stand afterward before, and he manages to crawl a few feet before Bokuto takes pity on him and sweeps him into his arms with a laugh that's breathless at the edges.

"How are you still so strong?" Hinata marvels aloud.

Bokuto turns a sly grin down at him.  "I'm not," he says, and tosses Hinata from his embrace.

Hinata's mind goes blank with shock, but he's only been thrown less than a meter from Bokuto's arms, and in the split second of free fall between being released and landing safely on the bed, that shock turns far too fast into arousal.

Yeah, he could _definitely_ get used to this strongman thing.

He's still digesting his own bearings on the mattress as Bokuto crawls onto the bed next to him, snuggling up behind him and spooning him in a tight cocoon of towels and warmth, burrowing his nose in the crook of Hinata's neck.

"Can I tell you a secret," he whispers.

Hinata whispers back, not sure why they're whispering but enjoying it too much to question it.  "What."

"You gotta promise not to tell anyone."

"What is it!"

"I love you."

He shifts just enough to look Bokuto in the eye.  "Well, it's a shame you want it so secret, because I wanna tell the whole world."

Bokuto seems to consider this for a moment.  "Oh, fine," he grumps, and from his tone Hinata gleans he never wanted it secret at all and laughs at him, reaching back to tickle him under the jaw.

"Can I tell you a bigger secret?"

"Totally.  I am a hoarder of secrets."

"I love you, too."

Bokuto lets out a loud, utterly fake gasp before whispering, "Really?"

Hinata nods.

"Holy shit!"

Giggling, Hinata cranes his neck back to kiss him, and Bokuto pulls him in, slipping a hand under the towel to trace around his nipple.  Hinata moans into his mouth, his arousal from being thrown still lingering, and Bokuto takes this as all the invitation he needs, which is fine, because Hinata is far too exhausted to have had to coax him further.

Hinata's ass is swollen and tender from abuse inside and out, and Bokuto is slow and gentle this time, cradling him close and kissing his neck as he rocks into him from behind.  The angle is _perfect_ for rubbing the head of his cock over Hinata's prostate, and Bokuto does it with deliberation, making Hinata melt into his embrace and sob into the pillow.  Bokuto whispers praise and admiration into his ear — "God baby, you're so damn pretty, you feel like heaven, I could just live here inside you, your sounds are like music, you're everything I ever wanted" — and Hinata clutches one of Bokuto's hands between his own smaller ones and pushes his hips back into him.  He cums dry, and Bokuto says he doesn't need to cum this time, and Hinata falls asleep the moment Bokuto slips out of him before either of them can decide what to do next.

He floats through dreams that feel like flying.

Waking is even better, the smell of Bokuto's sheets strong in his nose, and it takes him a few blinks of the sun streaming in lazily through the windows onto an unfamiliar carpet before he remembers that it all happened, and it's real.

Of course, a sinking guilt reminds him, this also means Tendou dumped him.

Bokuto seems to have woken first, his hand skating down Hinata's naked waist to his hip as he whispers into the back of Hinata's neck, "Mornin', sunshine."

Hinata hums complacently in response.  His throat is still a bit scratchy and his gut aches from the pounding it took in the bathroom, but every throb chases away the guilt of being dumped with a cheerful reminder that Bokuto finally happened, it's real, he's here, and he relishes it.  Bokuto's hand rubs down to his thigh, and Hinata reaches down to interlace his fingers with his own, encouraging him to touch closer, more.

Bokuto kisses the back of his neck.  "You tasted so goddamn good last night," he says.

"Mm, did I?"

"You sure did."

"That wording kinda makes it sound like a fluke," he says teasingly.

He feels Bokuto smile into the crook of his neck.  "What, like you won't taste good now?"

"Is that what you're implying?" he asks, still teasing.

"Hmm," Bokuto says thoughtfully, his hand pausing in its ministrations a centimeter from Hinata's cock.  He turns that wolfish grin on him again.  "Let's find out," he says, and before Hinata can reply Bokuto has whipped the towels off them and scooted down the mattress, grabbing Hinata's legs and twisting him to flop onto his back.  He grips both of Hinata's ankles in one massive hand and grabs a hair towel with another, lifting Hinata by the ankles like a trussed up chicken and stuffing the towel under the small of his back.

With all the heavy lifting and throwing Bokuto has been doing with seemingly zero effort, Hinata is beginning to feel like either he weighs far less than he thought, or Bokuto is far stronger than he ever imagined.

He doesn't have time to contemplate it, though, because Bokuto has pressed Hinata's thighs up to his stomach and settled his face between them, licking a torturous line with the tip of his tongue from Hinata's taint, between his balls, all the way up the underbelly of his dick, and Hinata lets out a shivery whine.  Bokuto sucks the head of Hinata's cock into his mouth, tonguing the slit, before he mouths a thick line back down the shaft.  He takes one testicle into his mouth, rolling it carefully, then the other, and Hinata clutches fistfuls of the sheets, moaning to the ceiling.  Then Bokuto leans his forearms on Hinata's thighs, reaching back down with his thumbs to open Hinata's cheeks.  Hinata draws a deep breath in anticipation.

Bokuto buries his face in Hinata's ass, licking and laving with insistent pressure, locking his lips around him as though he were french kissing a mouth, and Hinata lets out the loudest, most whorish moan at the feel of it, hands flying to Bokuto's hair.  The tip of his tongue spears into Hinata's hole, and it writhes there, trying to gain ground into the swollen flesh.  After a moment, he gives up, and he lifts his face just enough to ask Hinata to grab the lube from the bedside table.

"This one," he says as he takes the bottle from him, "is flavored like melon, and _not_ candle wax."

Hinata laughs at the absurdity of that declaration before a gasp is ripped from him at the cold pour of lube down his feverish skin.  It is quickly contrasted by the warmth of Bokuto's mouth, and Bokuto lets out an appreciative hum as he dives straight back to work, pushing a finger in through the lube to help his tongue open Hinata's hole.  The length of the finger sliding into him feels sore, but he's too flooded with adrenaline and _want_ to care about that for now, and he rolls his hips into the sensation.  Bokuto spreads him open from the inside, pushing his tongue in as far as it will go, so far his teeth dig into Hinata's flesh, and he wriggles it inside him, forming shapes that make Hinata squeal and squirm.

He draws back after a few minutes with a long lick up the full length of Hinata's crack to his taint, though his fingers readily take the place of his tongue inside him, thrusting in and out steadily.  It still burns a little, but that's fading.

"God," Bokuto moans, watching his fingers at work, "I wanna fuck you so bad but you're so beat up."

"Fuck me," Hinata begs, "fuck me, please Koutarou, fuck me—"

Bokuto blinks at the use of his given name, but he shakes his head.  "You gotta use this thing for its rightful purpose at some point, and it'll hurt if you've used it too much for other things."

"I don't care—"

"You will."

"I just want you—"

"I know," Bokuto whines, slumping a little, though his fingers thrust on.  "I do too, baby, fuck, don't tempt me.  Take it from me, ignoring your limits that much is a bad idea, I don't wanna hurt you."

Seeing as he still cannot recall whether he's ever marathoned this much sex at once in the past, he decides it is better to err on the side of caution and allow Bokuto, who is sure of his experience, to dictate this, and he relents with a pout.  "Make me cum without it, then," he says, and Bokuto's face lights up.

"Gladly."

Between his tongue and his fingers, Bokuto is more than equipped for the task, but Hinata's body hasn't quite replenished itself yet, and he cums dry again.  What little he does release, Bokuto licks off his belly, sucking his skin clean like he hasn't eaten in years.

He pulls the towel out from under Hinata and chucks it in a heap on the floor.  He's almost too heavy for it, but he lies down on top of Hinata anyway, cheek to chest with his hair tickling Hinata's chin.  Hinata brushes it out of his face and then plays with it, twisting it endlessly around his fingers.

He stares up at the ceiling.

It seems strange to him that not even twelve hours ago, he was up there, in the bedroom above their heads, getting dumped by a person he'd never put enough effort into loving in the first place because he'd been too preoccupied with pretending not to love the one he's with right now.

Tendou had said he doubted he could feel romantic love at all, or even wanted to, and Hinata doesn't think Tendou is broken or out of line for that.  He doesn't think there's anything wrong with love that's aromantic or with having sexual relationships that don't revolve around romantic love.

But it's simply not the type of love he feels for Bokuto, and that's not the type of relationship he wants, either.

"Hey," he says quietly, "can I ask you something?"

Bokuto hums into his chest in prompting.

Hinata swallows on a suddenly dry tongue.  "So… we're boyfriends now, right?"

"That is exactly what I want to be," Bokuto says, and Hinata's heart leaps.  "But we can be whatever you wanna be, if you don't.  I won't say I'll be super happy about it, but—"

"I wanna be boyfriends!" he says, perhaps a little too emphatically because Bokuto laughs at him, but when Bokuto says "Awesome" and laces their fingers together, Hinata could stand on the roof and scream his excitement to the heavens.

Bokuto says, "Can I ask _you_ something?"

"You just did."

Bokuto kicks his ankle.  "Smartass."  Hinata giggles at himself, but Bokuto presses on, "Are you sure you don't mind me being boyfriends with Tetsu too?"

Hinata's mouth opens, but he stops.

That moment in the training camp bathroom remains one of his clearest memories, and he can still recall the explosive fire of jealousy he'd felt, but when he tries to envision the pair of them in a similar position now — perhaps in Bokuto's bathroom, bent over the sink as they've just done — he can't recreate the feeling.  Instead, the heat that floods into him is the same heat that thunders through his veins at the sight of Bokuto's thighs in that dance video he still has saved.

He swallows dryly again.  "No, I don't mind at all."

He hadn't been aware of how tense Bokuto had gone upon asking that question until he feels Bokuto's form relax against him.  "Oh good."

There's a thump in building corridor just outside the wall, and he hears Arakita's muted, distant swearing through the sheetrock.

Bokuto doesn't acknowledge it.  "Can I ask you something else?"

Hinata tries to glance down at him, but can't see his face from this angle.  "Yeah?"

"What the fuck were you doing with that Shiratorizawa guy for over two years that he never ate your ass?"

Hinata blinks at the ceiling, ears pricked for the sound of a sneeze filtering down from the bedroom above.  He may not have put enough effort or attention into being a good boyfriend to Tendou, but that doesn't mean Tendou was ever a bad one, and the implication raises his hackles a little.  There's a touch of defense in his voice as he says, "Literally anything else?"

"Why?"

"Wh… there's plenty else to do besides stick your tongue halfway up the hole that poop comes out of."

"Okay, but, you wash it, right?"

Hinata lets out a bewildered snort, blinking wildly.

"That wasn't rhetorical," Bokuto stage-whispers, and a shout of laughter bursts out of Hinata despite himself.  "I have had my tongue up there twice now, this is kind of vital information, I need to know this, do you wash your ass."

"Yes," he says, "yes, I do."

"Okay, so what's the problem?"

"It's… the principle of the thing, I think."

"He's got some weird principles, then."

Hinata thinks this is a rather rich comment coming from someone who prioritizes licking bowels over _not_ doing so, but seeing as he really can't deny it feels fucking amazing and he in fact goaded Bokuto into doing it a mere few minutes ago, he doesn't feel he's got enough moral high ground to retort.

Bokuto doesn't seem to need him to.  "Can I ask you one more thing?"

"Just the one?"

"You are such a shit," he says, tickling Hinata's ribs.  When Hinata has calmed his laughter, Bokuto asks, "So do you pretty much always wanna bottom, or do you wanna switch it up sometimes?"

Hinata shrugs, a difficult task for the shoulder pinned under Bokuto's head.  He enjoys receiving, sure, but enjoys giving nearly as much, and isn't particularly attached to one over the other.  He did both in fairly equal turn with Tendou, and there was never anything about that arrangement that dissatisfied him.  The memory of the training camp bathroom still dancing around his thoughts, it occurs to him that Bokuto had been receiving back then, and therefore would probably enjoy it now, too.

"I don't mind either way," he says.  "You really are bigger than I've had before and I love feeling that fill me up, but I'm definitely not opposed to fucking you."

Bokuto props himself up on an elbow and grins.  "Sweet," he says, and swoops in to drop a kiss on Hinata's nose.  "I gotta shit first, though," he adds, "I've got a turtle head poking out," and he's slid over Hinata and hopped out of bed stark naked, shutting the bathroom door behind himself before Hinata has even started laughing at the bluntness of that phrasing.

Hinata shouts at him through the door, "Make sure you wash your ass!"

The muffled reply comes back, "I mean why _wouldn't_ I?"

Bokuto turns on the tap to muffle the toilet sounds, but when he starts singing to himself loudly and slightly off key, Hinata cracks up again.

He closes his eyes, comfortably warm despite having the makeshift cover of towels tossed away from him, and sighs contentedly to himself.  He rewrites the fantasy image of Bokuto and Kuroo fucking over Bokuto's bathroom sink, being sure to place Bokuto on his belly this time, moaning into the basin, and his chest goes hot and fluttery at the expression he imagines on Kuroo's face as he drives into Bokuto.

His cock throbs in protest, but it can't ignore hormones any more than Hinata can ignore the memory of Bokuto's hips pounding against him, and it starts to swell despite itself.

Lost in his own little world with senses dulled by Bokuto's singing, the slam of the front door is what pulls his eyes open, and he isn't alert enough to realize what it means or fast enough to pull another towel over himself before Kuroo is standing in the bedroom doorway, Oikawa and Sugawara right behind him.  He grabs a towel and whips it up to his chin, but they've already seen everything, and Kuroo's face breaks into the broadest Cheshire grin.

"Congratulations," he purrs.  Hinata whimpers in response, and Kuroo lets out a peal of hyena laughter, leaning on the doorjamb.  Oikawa blinks at him like a viper who's just detected a field mouse.

Kuroo sniffs away his laughter and rights himself.  "Where's Koutarou?"  Hinata glances at the bathroom door, in the direction of Bokuto's now even more off-key singing, and Kuroo seems to understand, because he says, "Ahh, cleaning out the pipes for round two, eh?"

"We— no—"

"Save it," he says, still grinning.  "Do you see me complaining?  No.  'Bout fuckin' time.  Since the day he met you, three whole years he's been crying to me, mostly figuratively but sometimes with literal tears, about how bad he wants you."

Hinata stares at him, stopped short.  "Really?"

"Doesn't mean I'm not gonna tease the both'a you for it though," he says, tapping a fist absently against the doorframe.  "I'm gonna make yakisoba.  You guys want some?  I assume you want something to eat other than ass, which I'm sure you've had aplenty by now."

"I… sure.  Thanks, Kuroo-san."

"You betcha," he says, sauntering from the door in the direction of the kitchen.  Sugawara follows, grinning over Oikawa's shoulder as he passes, but Oikawa just stands there, eyes wide, a ghost of a smile playing about his mouth.

He stays still long enough that Hinata, nestling his chin into the towel covering him, says sharply, "Can I help you with something?"

"Did he actually do it?"

"Do… what?"

"Did he eat your ass."

He says it so nonchalantly, as if asking his favorite color, and Hinata splutters, "Wh… why would you ask that?"

"All he talks about is how he wants to eat your ass.  Did he do it or not."

Hinata struggles to generate a response that properly encapsulates his indignation at this question, but all that comes out is a strangled sort of gurgle before he's saved by Kuroo calling from the kitchen, "You don't need to know what they got up to, Kusoikawa."

"Yes I do," Oikawa insists, "and you don't get to call me that!"

This time it's Sugawara who cuts him off with, "Let him sleep, Tooru."  His voice is much closer than Kuroo's had been, and Hinata finds out why as Sugawara leans back into the doorframe.  He grasps the doorknob, giving Hinata a hammy and utterly conspicuous wink and thumbs up as he pulls the door shut on Oikawa's petulant face.

On the other side, Oikawa's voice whines, "I just wanna know if an ass got ate!"

Hinata tugs the towel up to his hair and groans into it.

When Bokuto emerges several minutes later and learns of the exchange, he barely takes enough pause to wriggle into the first pair of pants he sees before he bounds from the room.  Hinata follows, having slipped into some of Bokuto's too-big boxers and a far-too-big shirt that almost renders the boxers unnecessary, to find Bokuto wilted dramatically into Kuroo's arms and all but singing how "He tastes like _candy_ , Tetsu, he's so perfect and beautiful."

"I'm so happy for you, Bokuto," Sugawara says sincerely, helping himself to a portion of yakisoba vegetables that is probably more than is strictly necessary.  Kuroo grunts at him for stealing food before he's added the noodles, but Sugawara doesn't seem to hear this.

Oikawa, seated at the dining table, gives Hinata the most infuriating smug snake grin over the top of a steaming coffee mug.  He raises his eyebrows appraisingly at Hinata's wardrobe.  "Cute."

"Shut up."

"Hey now, that's no way to speak to your future captain," Oikawa says, though the admonishment in his tone is all false.  "Assuming you are coming to this school, that is?"

Hinata's stomach does a funny flipping motion; in the quagmire of relationship strife he's been stuck in since nationals, he'd quite forgotten Oikawa is volleyball captain here.  He swallows hard.  "Well, I mean, it is the only school I applied to…"

"And obviously you're playing, right?" Oikawa says, barely audible through Sugawara's food-garbled cry of "YAAAAY" and Bokuto's shriek as he rushes back to Hinata's side and sweeps him into his arms.  As he adjusts himself in Bokuto's embrace, he hears Kuroo ask, "You got housing set up and shit?"

"Well, I was planning on staying with Satori," Hinata says, his stomach flipping harder at the memory, "but seeing as that's… no longer a thing…"

"Wait," Sugawara says, his face falling flat, "you guys broke up?"

Bokuto rubs Hinata's back in slow circles, and Hinata nods quietly.

Kuroo turns to look at them, and for a second, his face seems almost disapproving, but the expression quickly melts into his default cavalier smile.  "Why don't you move in here, then?"

Bokuto nearly drops Hinata, and he thanks the gods he hasn't gotten used to being held and is still bracing himself on Bokuto's shoulders, or he would've fallen.  He lets out a dumb, "What?" at the same moment Bokuto says, "For real?"

"Sure," Kuroo says, doling out the finished yakisoba into bowls.  "You can take Koutarou's room, and Koutarou, you can just float — pick who you want to stay with night by night."

Hinata thinks this is the best idea in the history of ever, and Bokuto seems to agree, as he bounces Hinata in his arms and screeches to the ceiling, his face bunched up with joy.  Oikawa doesn't wait for them to calm down before he murmurs to Kuroo, "Shame Tobio-chan didn't pick this school, though.  I would've loved bossing him around again."

"If I had to guess, I'd say that'd be the primary reason he didn't pick this school," Kuroo says, passing bowls around the table, and Hinata plants a kiss on Bokuto's lips before squirming out of his arms and claiming a bowl, shoveling food into his mouth with reckless zeal.

"Shame your QP isn't here, either," Oikawa tacks on, and Kuroo makes a sound of agreement, but this phrase rings a bell in Hinata's head, a bell that sounds peculiarly like the moment the world stopped spinning.

He turns to Sugawara.

"What's QP mean?"

Sugawara, Kuroo, and Oikawa all answer at the same time — "It's all the emotional intimacy of dating but it's not romantic" — "It's like a best friend but like, Official" — "It's like a boyfriend but without the fucking" — and in the midst of Kuroo countering, "Well, I dunno, we do a fair bit of fucking," Hinata and Bokuto's eyes meet, and he feels like maybe the world is stopping again.

It's not until they crowd onto the elevator in a noisy, walk-of-shame-wearing pile, though, that he knows for sure, because he finds himself face to face with Tendou and suddenly the elevator goes dead quiet, and then he knows the world has stopped, because there is no sound in space.

Tendou is trying to make that blank, unreadable face again, but Hinata can read it this time, and what he sees there is anger.

"Thought it was your sex noises I've been hearing."

He thinks Oikawa makes a sound, but he's quickly elbowed silent.  For himself, Hinata doesn't know what to say, and his stomach is churning too violently for him to try.  It's sickening, almost embarrassing, how easy it had been to forget that the breakup wasn't a thing of ill fantasy and had only taken place hours ago, and of course, Tendou hadn't disappeared off the planet in the aftermath.  He could only have been upstairs, separated from them only by a few inches of sheetrock and steel and empty, empty air, the entire time.

He feels compelled to apologize, though he isn't sure how, or why.

Tendou stuffs his tightly balled fists into the pocket of his hoodie — the same star speckled one he had lent Hinata more than two years ago — and aims his cold, angry stare at Bokuto.  When he speaks, though, it's for Hinata.  "Sure was a quick turnaround."

This, Hinata decides, would be an excellent place to start an apology, but when he opens his mouth, it's Kuroo's voice that breaks the silence.

"Excuse me," he says, "but didn't you, like… cut him loose?"

Tendou's gaze slides across to Kuroo reluctantly, as though the brain is obligated to acknowledge the speaker, but the eyes would rather not.  "Yeah, I did."

"And isn't he a grown-ass adult who can make his own choices?"

"He sure is," he says, though his tone indicates he believes the opposite.

"Good," Kuroo says, ignoring the tone, "then there's no problem here."

Tendou's stare returns to Hinata, who feels his chance to make it right slipping away by kilometers with every passing second.  "So that whole huge fight about how you didn't want him more than me.  All a lie?"

"No," Hinata says, and in the shift of Tendou's face from angry to sardonic, he knows he shouldn't have.

"Oh," Tendou says, looking at Bokuto's hands clamping protectively over Hinata's shoulders, "but clearly—"

"I don't want him more," Hinata clarifies.  "I want you both.  At the same time."

"I'm down with that," Bokuto says, and before Hinata can say he didn't mean a threesome, Tendou's face morphs from derision to an expression that nearly makes Hinata puke right there in the elevator car — disgust.  He half-hears the exchange between Bokuto and Kuroo behind him ("Wow, you were way too prepared with that answer."  "What?  I'm just saying, look at him.  I know his dick is big."  "Jesus Christ."  "I know it.  I know it's big") as he tries to steady his rolling stomach, but the hurt and disappointment on Tendou's face make it hard to keep breathing.  As the elevator dings and lurches to a stop, he slowly feels the world start spinning again, and just like at the New Years party, he doesn't feel like it's spinning in the direction he wants.

Good fucking God, he's done it all over again.

Bokuto comes to his high school graduation.  Hinata's mom loves him, but once he's gone, she can't resist saying she's sad Tendou won't be around anymore.  Hinata doesn't have the strength to say that makes two of them.

He moves in with Bokuto and Kuroo, and Kuroo's proposed sleeping arrangement works beautifully.  Bokuto, rejoicing in the resolution of his three years of pining, chooses to stay with Hinata nearly every night, and Kuroo is perfectly sympathetic to that and doesn't get jealous (though, as he had warned, it doesn't stop him from picking on them about it).  There's a short adjustment period where Hinata learns to stop tiptoeing the wary dance of not stealing the other man's man, and where it slowly dawns on him that the explosive jealousy from summer camp is not going to kick back in, but as he calms down and settles into the arrangement, it's warmer and more like home than he'd ever expected.

There's only one thing missing, like a puzzle with one piece that's been lost, eternally incomplete.

He finds himself staring up at the ceiling one night, envisioning the room above that he knows so well, and wondering what Tendou is doing up there, and his brain grinds to a halt, half surprised at himself, half angry.  He's done this already — the pining, the aching, the wanting.  He knows what comes of ignoring it, and it's nothing good, nothing that allows him to enjoy what he's got while he's got it.

There's only one thing for it, then.

In the meantime, he tries to play it cool, even on the volleyball court the next afternoon, internally debating whether to seek Tendou out or let chance work its magic but externally trying to pay attention to warmups.

"Koutarou, come hit some spikes for m— oi," Kuroo cuts himself off, his voice going flat as he turns and spots Hinata in Bokuto's arms again.  "Look," he says, pointing them out to Sawamura, who laughs at the sight.  "Look at what I have to live with."

"You almost sound like you're not happy for him," Oikawa says.

"I was!  I thought I would be!" Kuroo cries, his tone taking on the timbre Hinata has come to recognize over the past weeks as his unique brand of barely perceivable joking.  "I thought I would be overjoyed that Koutarou can finally shut the fuck up about wanting him.  But look at this shit.  Look at what I have to deal with, twenty-four hours a day."

Koganegawa laughs so hard he falls over while trying to stretch, and Sawamura says, "I dunno, I think it's cute."

"You don't live with it," Kuroo counters.  "They're like puppies without a mother.  Slobbering all over each other and clinging like spider monkeys."

"So are they monkeys, or puppies?" Sugawara wonders aloud, exchanging a grin with Sawamura.

Kuroo ignores this.  "And then there's _this._   This thing you're doing.  Why do you keep doing that."

"Doing what?" Bokuto says innocently, shifting Hinata to one hip, and Hinata giggles.

"Carrying him like a small baby."

"He is a small baby."

"No, he's not, is he five?  His legs work, put him down."

"No," Hinata protests, locking his knees around Bokuto's waist and his arms around his shoulders, and Bokuto hugs him tighter in response.  "Don't, I like it."

"He likes it!"

"I heard him.  He's a grown-ass man, he doesn't need a big-boy translator.  Quit kinking in front of everybody, you guys are so goddamn weird."

Hinata ignores this, looking Bokuto in the eye and saying in a very serious voice, "Hold me, strong daddy."

"Okay," Kuroo says, dropping the ball over his shoulder and raising his hands in a gesture of surrender, "y'all are too much for me, Your Kink Is Not My Kink."

Sugawara catches the ball on its second bounce and says, "Isn't there supposed to be a 'And That's Okay' after that?"

"No," Kuroo says, the insincerity in his voice growing stronger.  "Only my kinks are okay.  It's not okay if it's not my kink."

Bokuto is now laughing so hard he can't keep holding Hinata, who is fine with being put back on his feet, because he'd rather not be dropped.  He straightens his shirt, observing as Oikawa peers at Kuroo over the top of his own ball and says softly, "It's kind of my kink."

"That's it," Kuroo says, "we are breaking up."

"We're not dating, Tetsu-chan."

"Wanna date?"

"You're just saying that."

"No, I mean it."

"Really?"

"No, we're breaking up."

"Shit."

"Hey," Koganegawa cuts in from his renewed attempt at stretching on the sideline, "what's _he_ doing here?"

As one, everyone's gaze turns to the doorway, though none as fast as Goshiki, who says in a tone of disbelief, "Tendou-san?"

Hinata whirls around to see Tendou framed in the light of the hallway, chewing his cheek nervously and staring fixedly at him.  He barely hears Sugawara assuring the first-years that Tendou does go here, he just didn't join the volleyball team, or Oikawa and Kuroo teasing him for having not done so.  He does hear the utter innocence in Bokuto's voice as he asks if Tendou is here to join the team at last, the total lack of ulterior meaning or motive, and his affection for him swells.  He reaches back to grip Bokuto's hand, and Bokuto looks down to give him a reassuring smile and the tiniest hint of a nod.

He looks back to Tendou, who is still watching him.  He seems to catch himself, as he shakes his head and cuts off the others' chatter with, "No, no I just… I came to… never mind, I think I should go."

"Our first match is against Toudai," Oikawa says, a tone to his voice like a hook on a line, and it catches Tendou as he begins to turn on a heel.  He stands stark still as Oikawa says, "You know who's on that team, I trust?"

"Yeah," Tendou says quietly, "I do, and there's no way you're gonna beat him, with or without me."

"We've done it before," Kuroo says, "but for sure, it'd be nice if we had someone who was used to his play style.  Someone with a little more experience with him than Goshiki here.  Someone who was his teammate for three years, for example."

"Kageyama-kun is there too," Hinata says, and he hears the plea in his own voice, a thousand hooks in addition to the one Oikawa has sunk.  "And I really, really wanna kick his butt."

Koganegawa chokes laughing.  Sawamura murmurs to Sugawara, "At least he's honest."

It's true, but it isn't what motivates Hinata now.  As he stares at the figure of the man he had, until a few weeks ago, called his own, it's not the team that drives him to say, "Please, Satori—"

Hinata can hear Tendou's sharp inhale all the way across the gym.  "Don't do that," he says softly.  "I mean it."

Hinata stands there, unsure what to say instead.

Oikawa bounces the ball like a basketball and says, "Look, we're not gonna stand here all day, Miracle Boy, you wanna play with us or not?"

Tendou stares at Hinata, then wrenches his gaze away, looking at each of the familiar players in turn — those he's been teammates with before, those he's played against — and something is being weighed behind his eyes as he slowly brings them back to Hinata.

"Sure," he says, shrugging a shoulder.  "If Wakatoshi's gonna hold his own on the national level, might as well put him through his paces."

Goshiki yells in triumph, Oikawa nods sagely, but Tendou doesn't acknowledge this.  He picks detritus out from under his nails and looks at Hinata.  "I wanted to talk to you a minute."

A rumbled murmur between teammates issues behind him, and he hears the squeaks and thuds of sneakers and volleyballs on the floor as someone elects to start practice, and in the midst of it, a hand hits his butt.  Hinata looks back to see Bokuto still behind him, smiling in a warm, quiet way that almost doesn't suit his boisterous nature, but fills Hinata with heat like plunging into a hot spring.

He doesn't really think he needs to ask, but he does anyway.  "Is it okay?"

Bokuto lets out a bark of laughter.  "You think I haven't noticed you still miss him?  Of course it's okay.  Go get 'im."

He could walk into the sun itself right now, and not notice any difference in warmth.

He goes.

The hallway isn't brighter than the gym, exactly, but it's flooded with sunlight rather than overhead fluorescents, and the shift turns Tendou's hair to fire.  He keeps picking at his fingernails.  "Look," he says to his hands, "I'm not in love with you.  That's not gonna change."

Hinata blinks at him.  If that's all he wanted to say, he could've kept it to himself.  "Okay."

"But… I miss you."

It's not the three words Hinata had wanted to hear, but it feels like them anyway, pulls on his heartstrings all the same.  "You do?"

"I miss holding you, and playing with your hair, and just… being near you.  You're the best friend I've ever had, and I feel… lost, without you.  Everything about us, what we had, what we did, it was perfect.  All except for the being in love part.  And sometimes I lie there at night and I just… it kills me to know you're so close, but not next to me.  I want you back.  I want to be with you again.  But I can't, because I don't want to fake an emotion that's not there."

Hinata's heart hammers against his ribs, a prisoner pounding on the bars.  "Then don't."

Tendou blinks at him.  "Don't… what?"

"Don't fake it.  Don't pretend it's there if it's not.  It doesn't have to be love for this to work."

He's stopped playing with his nails, and he shoves his hands in his windbreaker pockets instead.  "I don't think it's that simple, Shouyou."

"Sure it is."  He glances back into the gym, at Sugawara, who had told him the very same thing all those years ago.  "If there's no place for romance to fit into your life, you don't have to try to cram it into places it's not going to fit."  And his gaze slides over to Bokuto, having stepped off the court to watch him from the sidelines, who bounces in place and gives him a thumbs up and a wink.  His heart skips a beat.  "Say, Satori… d'you know what a QP is?"

Tendou follows Hinata's gaze, and Bokuto, caught eavesdropping, hastily jumps into the action on the court.

"No," he says slowly.  "But… I'm sure you could explain it to me, if you wanted to.  Maybe… over udon?"

Hinata grins up at him, and as Tendou smiles back, he feels a long lost puzzle piece sliding into place.  "I'd like that."


End file.
